Current Position

Research Interests

In the last five years I have been interested in the molecular epidemiology of Streptococcus pneumoniae associated with infection. S. pneumoniae is recognized as an important cause of morbidity and mortality especially among pre-school children. Nevertheless this pathogen is also a normal colonizer of the nasopharynx of healthy individuals. The aim of the study is to characterize pneumococcal strains isolated from infections, using several phenotypic and genotypic methodologies, and identify characteristics of more virulent strains for further studies such as host-pathogen interaction.